1. Field of Invention
Embodiments of the invention described herein pertain to electronic motion sensing, communication of sensor-derived data and three-dimensional graphic display. More particularly, but not by way of limitation, one or more embodiments of the invention enable a system and method for graphically displaying a coin toss using sensors to detect the physical movement of a coin, e.g., an instrumented coin or coin observed by external sensors, communication of sensor-derived data to a remote graphical display system, and display of a virtual coin or graphical coin that represents the movement and orientation of the actual coin.
2. Description of Related Art
During an athletic event, for example football or soccer, a coin toss is used to determine which team is given the choice of playing direction and/or possession of the ball, i.e., the initial advantage. Before the coin toss, an official such as a referee will show both sides of a coin to the respective teams. The referee will toss the coin into the air, and one team guesses what side of the coin will face up when the coin lands on the ground. Only the referee and the team members in the vicinity of the coin toss see the movement and orientation of the coin as it is tossed. A coin toss may also be used for gambling, games and other entertainment.
A device which relates to a coin with any functionality other than currency is found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,619,066 filed Aug. 31, 1994 to Curry et al., which describes a coin shaped memory object (see Col. 2, 11. 14-31). The '066 device does not contain any instrumentation to provide location, position, orientation or any other spatial measurement. In summary, there are no known coin devices that are instrumented to provide their spatial information and communicate that information for display.
Thus during a suspenseful part of the pre-game activities, thousands of people viewing the game in the stadium and many thousands of people viewing on television (TV) cannot see the movement and orientation of the coin before, during, and after the toss. It would be beneficial to allow viewers to observe the coin toss without requiring that the viewers wait for the referee to announce the result. Hence, there is a need for a system and method for graphically displaying a coin toss so that the viewing audience may observe the coin toss as it occurs and observe the result of the coin toss when the coin comes to a resting position.